Below is the Save the Basin Campaign (STBC) submission to the Let’s Get Welly Moving (LGWM) engagement process on its four proposed scenarios for Wellington transport. Thanks to all the individuals and groups who submitted in favour of a modern, sustainable transport system for Wellington, and against a transport system which would perpetuate the failed proposals of the past – such as one or more Basin Reserve flyovers.

As you’ll see, Save the Basin’s submission focuses on the role of the Basin Reserve as a valued part of Wellington heritage, identity and urban design, and supports transport proposals that do not imperil that role, and enhance Wellington’s status as a liveable city designed to meet the needs of people, not cars.

In supporting Scenario A, STBC also urges that it be accompanied by additional actions such as transport demand management and serious option development and assessment of public transport options such as light rail. This could be called Scenario A+.

The Save the Basin Campaign has said that aspects of the new Wellington transport plans unveiled today “feel like a slap in the face of the new Government”.

Several of the new “scenarios” for Wellington transport unveiled today by Let’s Get Wellington Moving (LGWM) – made up of the New Zealand Transport Agency (NZTA), Greater Wellington (GW) and Wellington City Council (WCC) – show that a version of the failed Basin Reserve flyover project (known as the Basin Bridge) remains on the table.

“NZTA’s Basin Reserve flyover project was an utter failure, and was rightly rejected by the courts,” said Save the Basin spokesperson Tim Jones. “LGWM and especially NZTA know people don’t want this failed flyover plan, yet here they go again!”

“It seems LGWM has learned nothing from NZTA’s track record of defeat,” said Mr Jones. “Have the last two years of ‘engagement exercises’ been a sham? What’s the point of putting us through all that malarkey only to come up with the same old, tired, motorway-dominated proposals?”

“These plans will not get Wellington moving. The induced demand of a road-first approach will just make traffic chaos throughout the city worse. We need to create viable transport alternatives to reduce dependence on private cars, and make travel easier and safer for the people who really need to use the roads.”

Mr Jones said that many other aspects of the new scenarios felt like a deliberate slap in the face of the new Government.

“The attempts to factor in the new Government’s aims of reducing carbon emissions and become a carbon neutral economy by 2050 are pathetic. There appears to be no attempt to take into account the new Government’s transport priorities. These scenarios look like they were drawn up by the National Party and rushed out at the end of the year to try to sneak them under the radar.”

In the 2014 Basin Bridge Board of Inquiry decision rejecting the previous flyover proposal, NZTA was taken to task for the many deficiencies in its consultation process. Mr Jones said the timing of the current round of consultation showed LGWM hasn’t learned from NZTA’s failures.

“LGWM has chosen to run a crucial consultation phase from now till mid-December, when people are caught up in the pre-Xmas rush,” said Mr Jones. “That looks a lot like a cynical attempt to minimise public input.”

“When and if LGWM provides a meaningful level of detail about their plans,” Mr Jones concluded, “Save the Basin will be able to decide if any of these scenarios are worth further consideration. Right now, it looks like LGWM needs to go back to the drawing board.”

This is it. At long last, the NZTA transport planners who were defeated over the Basin Reserve flyover are going to put their new plans on the table. Be there to have your say – see below for when, where & how!

RSVP by Tuesday. If the invite links below don’t work for you, urgently email info@getwellymoving.co.nz for an invitation, or just tell them you plan to attend the event. Be polite, but be resolute.

Don’t let the short notice or the bad timing of this ‘consultation exercise’ stop you. NZTA have refused to rule out proposing another flyover at the Basin Reserve. Are you going to let them get away with that?

Be there if you possibly can: Prefab, this coming Wednesday, 15/11, 6.30pm.

To make Wellington more liveable and support the region’s growth we need to change the way we move in, around and through the city. Last year we asked the people of Wellington what they think about Wellington’s transport.

Now we’re back with some possible future scenarios that aim to move more people without more traffic. We’ll be seeking the public’s feedback on these in late November and early December to help us develop a preferred scenario.

We’d like to invite you to the launch of our public engagement on the 15th of November, so we can share with you our ideas to Get Wellington Moving.

That’s good news at the start of a year in which important decisions are likely to be made about the future of transport in Wellington. The NZTA/WCC/Greater Wellington Let’s Get Welly Moving project is running half-day workshops in February which will represent the first opportunity for the public to get to grips with LGWM’s transport thinking for Wellington in the wake of the defeat of the proposed Basin Reserve flyover.

Will LGWM’s transport thinking reflect recent developments in transport, mobility and access? Will it allow for a rapidly changing transport environment in which the need to:

reduce greenhouse gas emissions from transport

increase resilience to climate change and natural disasters, and

account for improvements in light rail, growing demand for walking and cycling infrastructure, the rise of electric vehicles and vehicle sharing, and the prospect of autonomous vehicles

There has been a changing of the guard at the top of the Let’s Get Welly Moving team. Programme Director Jim Bentley has resigned to take up a position in Australia, and he’s been replaced by Barry Mein.

Barry Mein’s previous position was as Project Director for the Auckland Transport Alignment Project. LGWM says “Barry also brings a lot of transport, local and central government sector experience to the programme and will enable us to learn from the Auckland project, while recognising the uniqueness of our Wellington situation. We look forward to all the experience he will bring to this programme.”

On 7 September, we have our first chance to see whether Barry Mein will continue the generally positive and open-minded approach of his predecessor. Here are the details from LGWM:

Event: Let’s Get Wellington Moving conversation series

Join Let’s Get Wellington Moving onWednesday 7 September at 6pm at Prefab, 14 Jessie St, for a progress update, chance to catch up with the team and meet new Programme Director, Barry Mein.

Networking will be be followed by a couple of brief presentations and lots of time for questions from the floor. We look forward to seeing you there.

Now that the Basin Reserve flyover proposal is consigned to the dustbin of history, work will soon begin on the redevelopment of the Basin Reserve as a cricket and recreation ground – and you have until 12 September to submit your ideas.

We’ve been working on a number of engagement options including the website and general public feedback portal that went live over the weekend — http://redevelopthebasin.org.nz/

We are developing different ways for people to let us know about how they want to use the Basin Reserve and what we can do to make it better for the people of Wellington, both as a premiere cricket venue and as a recreation space.

These are going to be considered as part of preliminary concept designs that local architects, Tennent Brown, have been commissioned to deliver. Once the concept designs are ready, we can continue to engage with people to test and refine our priorities and options before any reports are taken to the Council.

The redevelopment will keep premiere test cricket at the Basin and open it up as a recreation space on non-game days. There will be fancy facility upgrades and better links for pedestrians and cyclists. With your input, we’re going to take a good thing and make it even better.

The Basin Reserve is one of the world’s top ten cricket venues. It’s also one of NZ’s most historic and picturesque cricket grounds. The Basin Reserve Trust has developed a Masterplan to present a 25-year vision for the future of the ground. You can find this plan online.

It’s a tough life being Minister of Transport Simon Bridges. He had ambitious plans to promote electric cars in New Zealand that were shot down by his senior colleagues around the Cabinet table, leading to a lengthy hiatus. Now one of those senior Ministers, Deputy Prime Minister Bill English, has launched an extraordinary attack on the consultative decision-making process that was set up with the support of Minister Bridges in the wake of the New Zealand Transport Agency’s failed Basin Reserve flyover plans.

Leaving aside the wonder that, in 2016, a supposedly mature politician could think that building flyovers in the centre of the nation’s capital city constituted a progressive transport option, Mr English’s remarks completely discounted the Let’s Get Welly Moving process which is due to continue until early 2017, and which is being run by the New Zealand Transport Agency, Greater Wellington Regional Council and Wellington City Council.

Fortunately, while usual suspects such as the trucking lobby popped out of the woodwork to support Bill English, Save the Basin and, in today’s editorial, the Dominion Post called out the stupidity of Mr English’s comments.

Maybe Mr English should stick to doing his job, and leave the transport thinking to those who are actually putting some time and thought into the matter.

The first phase of the Ngauranga to Airport Governance Group’s Let’s Get Welly Moving process, which is designed to find out what principles people in the Wellington region think should underlie Wellington transport planning, draws to a close at the end of May.

The next phase will be a call for proposals to rethink Wellington transport. We encourage you to put forward proposals that enhance Wellington role as a city for people, not a city for cars – and that ensure the Basin is not again put at risk.

Basin Reserve rainbow. Photo: Patrick Morgan.

Save the Basin Campaign Inc: Submission in response to the “Let’s Get Welly Moving” Engagement Phase

Introduction

As set out in its Constitution, the Save the Basin Campaign Inc has the following purposes:

(a) Promote, preserve and protect the historic character of the Basin Reserve area

(b) Promote high quality urban design and environmental management of the Basin Reserve area

(c) Promote an appropriate role for the Basin Reserve area in the development of a high quality, sustainable transport network, recognising the importance of the Basin to the public transport spine, and the importance of walkability and public transport for the users of the area

(d) Do anything necessary or helpful to the above purposes.

These purposes both explain why our Campaign was completely opposed to the proposed Basin Reserve flyover and took part in two successful rounds of legal action to prevent it gaining resource consent, and why we will oppose any future attempts to build a flyover or other transport infrastructure at the Basin Reserve that threatens the character, landscape, urban design or heritage of the Basin precinct – whether or not such infrastructure is presented as part of a larger package of resource consent applications.

Equally, however, these purposes allow us to participate in discussions about appropriate, sustainable transport developments that involve the Basin Reserve precinct, and thus we are pleased to see the breadth of the engagement process that the Ngauranga to Airport Governance Group has chosen to engage in as the first phase of its Let’s Get Welly Moving process.

Our submission covers three broad areas: the wider transport context, our comments and concerns about the rest of the planned consultation process, and our views on what should be done at the Basin Reserve.

Save the Basin took part in the development of the engagement and transport planning principles for the post-Basin environment submitted under the aegis of Grant Robertson MP, and those principles should also be regarded as part of our input to the engagement process.

The broader transport context

The present engagement process is being carried out at a time of rapid and disruptive change in transport thinking, transport behaviour and urban design – change which means that business-as-usual thinking is no longer appropriate.

These changes include:

the Government’s signing of the Paris climate change agreements and its commitment to an associated greenhouse gas emissions reduction target, meaning that serious steps will need to be taken to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from transport

increased readiness by both central and local government to fund and provide infrastructure for active modes and public transport

the increasing acceptance that building new roads induces further traffic congestion, as amply demonstrated by many local as well as overseas examples

the post-2007 breakdown of the previously accepted correlation between population growth and growth in VKT, as notably seen in changes in young people’s transport thinking and behaviour

the advent of disruptive technologies such as the wider uptake of car-sharing arrangements; electric vehicles; and driverless cars, with their associated requirement for far less road space

a refocusing of urban design, in cities as diverse as Seoul and New York, to put people first rather than cars first.

In our view, a prudent response to these developments by the Governance Group should be to focus on transport behaviour change while also looking to make incremental improvements in transport infrastructure that do not commit the city to major infrastructure developments which may well be rendered redundant by transport behaviour changes, and which would foreclose other, more appropriate responses.

The engagement process: comments and concerns

While we welcome the change in approach represented by the “Let’s Get Welly Moving” (LGWM) process, we still have some concerns about how this is being carried out, and suggestions for improvement:

Methodology and weighting of responses received

The first phase of the LGWM process has been carried out region-wide. However, given the potentially competing interests involved, we submit that there should be a methodology which gives most weight to those most directly affected by potential infrastructure changes along the Ngauranga to Airport Corridor: that is, those who live closest to them.

Calling for proposals

The next stage of the process includes calling for proposals. As such proposals can be both time-consuming and expensive to develop, especially for community groups with limited access to professional resources, we submit that the Governance Group should make available independent advice to assist those who wish to make proposals to do so – similar to the role the “Friend of the Submitter” plays in complex resource consent hearings.

Modelling: assumptions and processes

The modelling tool(s) chosen, and their underlying assumptions, will be of crucial importance in assessing the proposals received and developing scenarios based on them. Therefore, we submit that an “open Government data” approach should be taken to the development and use of these modelling tools. This approach should both

allow and encourage the involvement of those in the wider community with expertise in the analysis and use of Government and modelling data to engage with the modelling process and challenge modelling assumptions and processes, with the aim of producing a modelling process that truly reflects the realities of the rapidly changing transport environment, and

take account of the range of ways in which the Wellington transport system may develop.

Consultation on scenarios

This is currently scheduled for January to March 2017. However, our experience is that it is extremely difficult to get people engaged in consultation processes during January and early February due to family commitments over the summer holiday period. Therefore, we submit that this consultation period should not begin until February 2017.

The future of the Basin Reserve: Save the Basin’s position

We believe that the starting point for consideration of the Basin Reserve’s future needs to be the final report of the Basin Bridge Board of Inquiry. We are disappointed that, so far, this does not appear to have been the case. While the immediate response of the applicant was to comb the report for possible grounds for appeal – an approach which proved unavailing in the High Court – the Governance Group should instead pay careful attention to the Board’s findings, which make clear the significance of the Basin Reserve and its environs for Wellington and its residents.

As those findings make clear, a narrow, transport-only focus on the Basin won’t work. What is needed is a long term vision and plan to protect and enhance an iconic cricket ground, create more open and green space, end urban blight and develop a transport space that accommodates pedestrians, cyclists, public transport users and cars.

The Board identified that the following options were worthy of further consideration:

Given the rapid and disruptive changes to transport outlined above, we believe that the best option for the Basin is the one which involves the least infrastructure development and provides the most flexibility for future developments. This is the BRREO, or a similar at-grade option. However, the other options foregrounded by the Board should also receive careful consideration.

What should happen next? Here is our 7-point action plan, some of which is now underway:

Reframe the Basin as a sporting, urban development and heritage area as well as a transport corridor.

Create a master plan for the whole area. Its national significance needs to be given appropriate recognition: instead of seeing the Basin, Pukeahu National War Memorial Park, the Governor General’s residence, numerous local schools and the heritage of Mt Victoria as isolated pieces, the rich history of the whole area should be celebrated.

Go through a robust process to evaluate transport options. Start by carrying out small improvements to bring relief to frustrated transport users, and evaluate these before considering whether a more expensive option is justified. Ensure that, following the Wellington City Council’s “transport pyramid” approach, the needs of walkers, cyclist, and public transport users are given precedence.

Upgrade the Basin and strengthen and preserve the Museum Stand.

Prioritise a Reserve Management Plan for the Basin (as already agreed by the City Council) that will establish key principles on how the ground should be preserved.

Put in place heritage protection for the whole ground in the City Council’s District Plan.

Re-develop Kent and Cambridge Terraces as grand public and private spaces, well connected to the Basin

The Basin Reserve is a place of local, national and (especially in its role as an international cricket ground) international significance. We support options that preserve and enhance its status. We do not support options that put that status at risk.

Here’s two useful things you can do for the campaign. One takes about ten minutes, the other could take a little longer. If you don’t have time to do both, please do the first!

1) Fill in the full survey at the “Let’s Get Welly Moving” site set up by the Governance Group: Go to http://www.getwellymoving.co.nz/, scroll down to the “Take the survey” button, and spend ten minutes telling the Governance Group what you do and don’t want to see happen to Wellington City and Wellington transport. What’s more important to you – a liveable city, or faster throughput of cars? This survey lets you state your preferences.

Though the Governance Group is using lots of engagement methods to find out what Wellingtonians, and residents of the region, want for Wellington transport, this survey is the most significant way you can participate at the moment.

Please encourage like-minded friends to fill this survey in as well.

2) Make a submission on Wellington City Council’s “Low Carbon Capital Plan” for the city – a plan which, you might want to suggest, is entirely incompatible with building more motorways or bringing more cars into the central city. You can find all the details on the plan, which as part of the Annual Plan 2016/17, and the consultation process here:

PS: Very soon, Wellington International Airport Limited is expected to submit its resource consent application for an extension to Wellington Airport runway. It was previously indicated that this project, if it goes ahead, would result in massive additional truck movements through the central city during a 3-year construction process – which could have a big effect on both inner city residents and Wellington’s transport systems. Watch out for more news on this in the near future.

As we signalled, the Ngauranga to Airport Governance Group has now sent out invitations to the launch of its post-Basin Reserve flyover engagement strategy, “Let’s Get Wellington Moving”. This is the Governance Group’s response to the defeat of NZTA’s Basin Reserve flyover proposal: effectively, a reset button for transport developments in the Ngauranga to Airport Corridor.

This time round, the focus is much wider than just the Basin Reserve – it covers the whole Ngauranga to Airport corridor, and it’s about transport behaviour change as well as transport infrastructure. So people who care about the future of the Basin Reserve, and people who want Wellington to transition to a sustainable transport system, should take the chance to get involved at an early stage and shape the principles that will drive the process.

Getting involved starts with having a strong presence at the engagement process launch. Numbers are limited, so I encourage you to RSVP now and make sure your voice can be heard. The invitation is below, and the key details are:

September 2015-Feb 2016: Analysis of proposals, using a new set of modelling tools that will supersede those use by NZTA in developing its Basin Bridge proposal, followed by selection of a small set of options.

The engagement will be region-wide, including with regional mayors, so it’s really important that Wellington voices, and pro-sustainable-transport voices, are strongly heard. Make sure you RSVP, get along, and get your voice heard!

12 April: Mt Victoria Transport Forum

Of course the engagement process launch is only the beginning – and the Mt Victoria Newsletter is hosting an event a week later to discuss these matters further, especially as they affect Mt Victoria. We’ll post more about this next week, but in the meantime, you can download the flyer here.